ESPN's Paul Finebaum flip-flops on Michigan stance

Radio and ESPN television personality Paul Finebaum.

Ever since media reports of a sign-stealing operation by Michigan’s football team surfaced, ESPN pundit Paul Finebaum has been a leading critic of the Wolverines and their head coach, Jim Harbaugh.

“Everything that happens from here on with [Michigan] is going to be tainted,” Finebaum said in November. “If Michigan wins the national championship and Jim Harbaugh is given that trophy, I think the rest of the sports world is going to turn its nose in disgust.”

Finebaum also called Harbaugh — who has denied knowing of the alleged sign-stealing — “sad” and “pathetic” for referring to Michigan as “America’s Team” amidst the scandal.

However, following Michigan’s 27-20 win over Alabama in Monday’s Rose Bowl, Finebaum made a surprising reversal of his previous claims. On Tuesday’s edition of ESPN’s “Get Up,” Finebaum was asked whether a Michigan title would still be considered tainted:

“I don’t think so, and I know what I said… [given the] current state of college football right now, it is such a mess, and while a lot of us find what we believe the case to be here to be repugnant, almost everything about college football right now is repugnant, so I think Michigan if they win… There will be haters out there, but most people, I think, are gonna go, ‘Congratulations, you were the best team.'”

With election season approaching, it’s safe to call this a flip-flop.

But why would Finebaum reverse his staunch opinions? There must be more to it than his broad-brush claim that everything about college football is currently “repugnant.”

Is it because Michigan beat Alabama, the SEC champions? After all, Finebaum is an SEC man through and through, a University of Tennessee graduate who spent 30 years as a beat writer in Birmingham and Mobile, Ala., and is the host of a daily talk show on ESPN’s SEC Network.

If the sign-stealing scandal is as repugnant as Finebaum says it is, why the reversal? Why not continue to beat the drum and argue that a potential national championship for Michigan would be illegitimate?

Could it be that reports of the scandal were overinflated? No media outlet has covered the issue more thoroughly than ESPN, a network that severed its longtime broadcasting ties with the Big Ten Conference in 2022. With the Worldwide Leader choosing to prioritize the SEC over the Big Ten, did it have an extra incentive to bury the Big Ten’s most prolific program?

With Michigan beating Alabama, it seems as though ESPN’s most vocal Wolverines critic, Finebaum, is attempting to save face.

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